


Finders Keepers

by palekwami (angstyfanboi)



Category: Naruto
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Alternate Universe- Magic, Ambiguous/Open Ending, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, F/F, Fluff and Angst, Happy Ending, Implied/Referenced Character Death, M/M, Minor Character Death, Multi, Not Canon Compliant, Ooc Sasuke, Pre-Relationship, Protective Kyuubi | Nine-tails | Kurama, Protective Uchiha Sasuke, Slow Burn, Soulmate-Identifying Marks, academy is like hogwarts but poorer, and itachi is trying, and pretty much OOC everyone tbh, angsty sasuke, fire wielder sasuke, healer sakura, jiraiya and kakashi are of course the perverts, kurama is done and has adopted naruto, like very protective, my babies are really cute i swear, no beta read because im a coward, no sakura bashing, touch starved naruto, tsunade is the fifth hokage, tw: anxiety attacks, unfortunately there is a Uchiha massacre and MInato and Kushina die and the third dies too, wind wielder naruto
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-24
Updated: 2020-02-27
Packaged: 2021-02-27 19:41:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 13,668
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22871170
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/angstyfanboi/pseuds/palekwami
Summary: Sasuke’s life is forged in midst of corpses and blood, Sakura is one forged in midst of wonder and flowers, and Naruto’s is one forged in midst of streets and loneliness.Though the first two met at the Academy, Naruto only joins when he seems to be the only person close enough to the Sage to know his whereabouts.Except Naruto doesn’t feel like trusting the Academy or any of the people on the team sent for him.And Sasuke has lost too much to lose yet another home, now that he seems to have found it.
Relationships: Haruno Sakura & Uchiha Sasuke & Uzumaki Naruto, Haruno Sakura/Yamanaka Ino, Hatake Kakashi/Umino Iruka, Jiraiya & Tsunade (Naruto), Jiraiya & Uchiha Itachi, Kyuubi | Nine-tails | Kurama & Uzumaki Naruto, Uchiha Itachi & Uzumaki Naruto, Uchiha Sasuke/Uzumaki Naruto
Comments: 17
Kudos: 159





	1. Homeless

**Author's Note:**

> So basically there’s this Academy that takes in kids to train them. Orochimaru killed Naruto’s parents. This is also a soulmate AU where person A will have each eye from a different color, own and soulmate’s, and when person A and person B meet their eyes will return to their own color. When your soulmate dies before you meet, the eye with his/her color will turn blind. Not everyone has a soulmate. The Tailed-Beasts here won’t be made of chakra but of magic.

Days at the Academy are now tense and heavy like stones and the thread of mourning and despair laces around Sasuke’s throat every second of the day.

He can hear the strained whispers hanging on the air like ghosts, especially on the main corridor where dark velvet curtains hide the portrait of the Third from lingering eyes that tear up in loss. Any slither on the corridor and everyone jumps, on edge, afraid Orochimaru is back now to kill the resistance that burns with promises of raging vengeance.

He looks at his reflection displayed on a window that shows the crying skies on the outside, to his onyx eye swirling with rage, to his blue eyes now devoid of any brightness. The only color he had in his life is now so dull as well it’s even painful to think about it. Sadness and hardship are unbecoming of color so similar to a summer day’s sky, to full lakes and a vast ocean and his magic whirling in his palms crackling like thunders. Sadness and hardship are unbecoming of happiness, so that’s probably his soulmate’s eye and not his own.

Despite the fact he hates being late, let alone late to a meeting with the new Hokage, he just can’t find it in himself to care right now. Orochimaru was looking for him, wasn’t he? Turning the whole Academy upside down to get even a glimpse of him, wasn’t he? He promised him unimaginable power, didn’t he?

So why is he still here, in this place where no one will teach him how to take back everything Itachi took away from him?

“Sasuke?” He turns to his side, surprised for the first time in many years, and meets Sakura’s downcast glance with slightly wide eyes. Hers are mint, both, but he still remembers when one of them was clear blue, like cotton candy and ice, though it took less than a day to meet Ino and find her true eye color.

He answers with an unceremonious grunt and she embraces her torso with one of her arms as if to keep the warmness to herself for a little longer.

“Are you coming?”

He hesitates, just shy of answering the wrong thing and alert everyone that something might be wrong with the great survivor of the Uchiha clan. Everyone is on edge, with side-casted glances filled with worry and distrust and expecting someone to stab them in the back; and though Sasuke doesn’t have anyone here that he would bend and break himself to protect other than himself and maybe Sakura, he has the Uchiha pride and unwaveringly loyalty to his family to drag their name yet again through the mud. So he hesitates, he opens and closes his mouth like a fish, trying to silence his mind that overwhelms him with different points of view each pointing to a different answer and a different way of acting.

“Yeah, in a second.”

The girl too hesitates, narrowing her eyes as if she’s expecting him to do something wrong in the next seconds. Her puppy eyes, usually so lost when things get out of hand as she is still drifting in this strange world, now study him wisely like a sensei would, deciphering the lies he covers with some truths. But then it’s gone, whatever she was looking for is not there, and she relaxes tired and overwhelmed, nodding her head weakly before walking ahead to knock on the Hokage’s door.

Sasuke lets go of the breath he didn’t know he was holding. His eyes beg for him to close them, to finally sleep, but even if he doesn’t admit it out loud, he is scared of what he will encounter if he is to close his eyes for more than a few seconds. Will it be the landscape of devastation and pierced bodies holding onto each other for comfort before they breathe their last breath? Will it be the predator eyes of a snake within human skin that taunts him with promises of unimaginable power?

He decides to leave those thoughts for another time and resumes his walking until he stands in front of the office, watching the dark mahogany door with a glare one would think the door did him any harm.

He dreads to know what awaits him on the other side, and if he always saw it as an opportunity to show his value on a mission before, now that he is clogged up with a deep wish for power that clings to his every ambition to wither them until they’re nothing, he fears someone has noticed this and is about to take measures to make sure it stays in his head.

His hand balls up in a fist and he knocks only once. The door opens almost immediately, silent in a way it wasn’t when the Third was still around. The memory is painful because it reminds Sasuke that the man who hugged his frail body after his home— for home is not a place but people, as far as Sasuke is concerned— was robbed from him by someone who should know just how important family is, is no longer alive and waiting inside this doors; and it’s been less than a week since he was still breathing, smiling and giving the Academy a glow that it lacks now.

“Come in.”

For a change, Kakashi is already inside and he’s not holding that perverted book of his. He would do a snarky comment about it if the air wasn’t so tense and somber and if the occasion was different, but since he isn’t he waits for the blonde woman to point him a chair so he can sit. He sneaks a glance to Sakura, to see the girl completely disregarding the authority in the room and curl her knees up to rest her petulant chin above them.

“I know you’re used to having things sugarcoated and softened to you brats, but that’s not me so I’ll be frontal and fast, as time is not on our side.” Sasuke almost dislikes her immediately, but there’s something about her eyes that give him a sense of internal peace that makes it impossible to hate her for her brashness when their wounds are still raw and tender. By his side, Sakura, who has always admired the specialized healer in front of her, trembles but settles just as fast, her backs getting a little straighter. “We’re closer to having a war in our doorstep, now that we’re considerably weaker, than we were before. You’ve been supposedly trained for situations like this but let me tell you you’d all be crushed if fighting against other Academy’s and the day when that will happen might be closer than you think.”

Kakashi, who has been silent this whole time, tense like a coiled spring just waiting to be freed from the pressure, locks eyes with Sasuke. Just like many times before, his visible eye stares at him but it might as well be looking to his blue eye alone as if it pains him but he has no other option than to torture himself.

Sasuke chooses to look to the Fifth again, and ignore his sensei.

“Orochimaru is a Sannin, and a damn powerful one, I’ll give him that. He dwelled in the dark arts long before the Academy got its hands on any scrolls about it, and he knows many seals and many spells we can only imagine. We’re completely fucked, in lack of a better word. We don’t have the resources to defend ourselves if the other elemental nations decide to attack us, let alone the resources to fight back if Orochimaru finds a way to return. We need help.”

“Who?”

The woman stares at him unblinkingly, and she too gets lost in the dissonant blue that can only belong to someone else, she too torturing herself or reminiscing of something Sasuke longs to know but no one ever tells him about. If his home has been destroyed he can only hope to find another or build it himself, but there’s this ache in him to know the person he is meant to find and love and keep and everyone seems to be reminded by someone he neither knows nor is told about. He hates being kept in the dark about things he has both the right and the need to know.

“Jiraiya, the other Sannin.”

“But, Hokage-sama, no one ever knows where Jirayia is.”

The woman pinches the top of her nose bridge in between her thumb and index, her other hand finding a silver flask effortlessly despite her eyes being closed shut. She doesn’t look at either of them until she has gulped down whatever is in there, and when she does her orbs are burning and the tip of her nose is stained pink, but she doesn’t look any less capable of crushing them to crisps in a heartbeat, showing how helpful healing skills can be when it comes to one's anatomy.

“You know there’s someone who does, Kakashi.”

Sakura snaps her neck to him. Her eyes hold questions to which he doesn’t have the answer either. If the air between the four of them was thick before, now it feels like it’s impossible to breathe, like all the oxygen was replaced by stones and the warmth was frozen over.

Their sensei’s eye widens, the mask over his mouth moves when he likely opens his lips in a gasp. Nothing has ever managed to leave him this surprised and both his students see this with curiosity growing from ripples to waves inside of them.

“You can’t possibly be thinking-…”

“But I am, do you have any objections?”

“He won’t be happy to see me.” He hesitates, looking away mournfully.

Except the older woman is having none of it and doesn’t seem the least concerned about his warning if anything annoyed at the man to the point she goes back to add pressure to the point resting in between her brows.

“That’s your mess to fix. We need help and he’s the only one who might know where that perverted is and if you fucked up before then make sure not to fuck up now.”

Kakashi takes a step forward, ready to protest one more time, to tell her this is a bad idea and it won’t work and they will go back to square one.

“This is not up to discussion. I’m giving you an order as your Hokage, Hatake, and I want you to follow it no matter what.”

Hopeless and lacking any strength or authority to say anything otherwise, Kakashi bows his head and goes back to his corner, sullen and silent in the way death is. The woman fixes some papers on top of her large desk and ends the meeting, telling them to leave her and Sasuke alone, ignoring the cold-shoulder Kakashi gives her when leaving, not bowing like he normally would before leaving.

He tries his best not to gulp, not to show any weakness to this stranger that is both arrogant and frontal when people here are used to humbleness and rose-colored speeches.

He knows he fails when she smiles kindly as if to reassure him, and hates to admit it works when his shoulders relax slightly.

“I know he was looking for you, Sasuke. I know what happened to your clan and I know you want revenge and I’m not gonna sit here and tell you you’ll become like Itachi if you murder him because that’s your choice to make and your conscience to take the consequences. What I’m gonna do is tell you that whatever Orochimaru promised you is not worth it.”

She opens a drawer and rummages through it before she finds whatever she was looking for, her eyes dulling and he can swear there are tears brimming them until she shuts her lids closed fiercely and shows them the picture in between her gentle, healer hands.

There are four people in that picture. One of them he recognizes as being the Third, younger sure, but with the same deep lines on the corners of his eyes and the same smile of someone who has a will of fire burning inside of him. In front of him, there’s a kid with white hair and the same marks on the corners of his kind-looking eyes, but the smile on his lips seems to be more arrogant than his sensei’s. Sasuke doesn’t recognize him, but he does recognize the blonde girl with a bright smile as being the Fifth, as he recognizes the kid with eyes painted purple and reptile golden orbs with slit pupils and ashen skin.

It’s Orochimaru. The Third was the Sannin’s sensei.

He looks up to the woman, perhaps realizing for the first time she too must be suffering, that not only him is plagued by failure and mourning, that she has lost people dear to her and if not to war to dark magic. In fact, there are deep circles stained purple and brown from lack of sleep, and the corners of her lips are turning downwards as if she tasted something sour. He doesn’t understand why she’s showing him this but he’s not annoyed if anything he is more curious and awed.

“That is Orochimaru, the _real_ Orochimaru. The man that came to you is a shell. His soul, the one that was born with him and gave him ambitions and desires and dreams and everything that makes us human, is gone. It was tainted and destroyed by black magic. This is the man I grew up with, the man I trained with and considered a brother. And he would never turn his backs to us like that, he would never _kill_ his teacher like that.”

She stops talking, choking on air as tears now soak her eyes and her cheeks and she can no longer keep them from coming. Tsunade grabs her flask and gulps down vigorously, drops rolling down her chin from her lips, not a care in the world. She is still crying after she drains the flask from alcohol, and now the pink stains both the tip of her nose and her cheeks.

“The man you met was a monster and he won’t help you get the power you want. He will use you and take _your_ power for himself and never allow you your revenge, you hear me Sasuke? Don’t trust the snake.”

The woman puts the photograph back inside the drawer, gently tracing each face tenderly with a fond smile that seems both pained and loving. Once she shuts the drawer loudly and turns to him with her eyes stoic, she no longer cries and he no longer hesitates.

“I’m giving you a chance to find another home.”

Now, it is him who chokes on the breath caged within his throat, aware of what it means to him but not what she actually meant.

“Don’t waste it by making the wrong choice, Uchiha Sasuke.”


	2. Homesick

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> To Sasuke, someone who's never met warmth must be someone as lonely as him.   
> or  
> In which Sasuke already misses the home he has yet to find.

“Sensei, who is the person we must meet?”

Kakashi, who has been nothing but a stoic stone without a voice for the whole trip, comes to a halt as if he cannot walk any further, and turns to Sakura with a blank expression that doesn’t betray anything.

“Jiraiya has a… protégée of sorts. If anyone knows where the Toad Sage is, it is him.”

“But who _is_ he?” This time, it is Sasuke who questions him, and this time Kakashi yet again focuses on the blue of his left eye with the same lost expression of someone who is reminded of his ghosts and the skeletons he keeps in his closet for company.

“His name is Naruto, Naruto Uzumaki. He never went to the Academy and lived all his life with his godfather, Jiraiya.” The tone he uses is one they’re used to hearing when he disclosures information for a mission: clipped, professional, and heavy enough for them to know what he’s saying is enough for whatever they must do and nothing else.

But perhaps it’s the way his name feels familiar, the way Kakashi avoids his eyes for the first time, that makes it impossible to stop the current of questions blooming inside of him. He can’t accept the silence this time, he deserves much more information than the one he is being given in crumbs while he starves.

“Why did he never went to the Academy? Why does he live with his godfather? How old is he?”

Sakura’s eyes are pleading, big and wide and back to being those of an innocent puppy thrown to the street in hopes of having a quick death, and her hand doesn’t hesitate at grabbing his arm to beg him to let go and accept things as they come. But can’t she see? Can’t she see they’re at war and closer to meeting their end and that no one finds them worthy enough of valuable information? Can’t she see they’re yet again being treated like tools instead of human beings?

Is he the only one who feels caged like a pig waiting to be sent for slaughter?

“Everything in its due time, Sasuke-kun; we’re running out of time and we must hurry.”

And just like that Kakashi resumes his walking, taking his book out of his pocket to keep reading and send the message that he is not to be disturbed by any more questions he doesn’t feel like answering. It frustrates Sasuke to no end, to be left, yet again, in the dark about things he has both the right and the need to know. And it frustrates him that Sakura chose the easy way, yet again, instead of fighting against the utilitarian way they treat them.

The vengeful rage inside of him, the one that never ends and if anything it subsides just enough to be forgotten, roars back to life like the fire he learned to control to make his father proud that one time Itachi wasn’t being the genius of the family. This one, however, he hasn’t learned how to control yet, and neither does he want to.

“Sasuke-kun-…”

“Not now.” He chastises, angry and disgusted and tired of the way everything works. The girl clasps her lips together, hopelessly, making herself silent and scarce and just accepting the way he treats her, never fighting back— she never does, she never screams, never wails, never protests, weak, weak, weak, weak, weak.

The muddy path gives way to a stone road the signals the beginning of the Leaf Village, and life rummages in waves of sound and body warmth that is enough to make them ignore the gray skies that threaten to pour down on them again. Sasuke is welcomed by the scent of fresh pumpkin bread and cinnamon, and scented smoke that lingers from chimneys and settles around the people, fading and dancing in gray tendrils when they’re caught in sudden movements that prompt it to move. Rows and rows of picturesque houses with structures of wood and stone, perched comically in tall buildings, casting long shadows across the street and over the people who walk in a whirlwind of life. It’s a stark contrast to how the Academy has been, but if they focus hard enough they can see the set line of their lips, and the way mothers grab their kids by the wrist, hard enough to bruise and keep them by their side.

In the dark alleyways, Sakura and Sasuke can see the shadows moving, the piercing eyes of vigilantes that joined the cause to protect the village. It appears that the giddiness is faked for the sake of children and outsiders, but they’re just as terrified, if not more, as the ones left by Orochimaru and his army to tell the story.

“He owns a store on the far end of the street. He is quite wary and brash, so don’t give him any reason to act or we will go back empty-handed and the Hokage won’t be pleased.” Yet, he seems to speak more to himself than to any of them, so it settles a wave of uneasiness inside the pit of the student’s stomach, one they have trouble quieting down.

They walk together, zigzagging through the crowd even when they’re recognized by the symbol on their cloaks and the people part slightly to let them through, suspicious eyes following them as if to make sure they’re the ones who will protect them rather than the ones they will need protection from. Mothers push their protesting kids behind them, clutching their frail arms, and those who know better cling to their mothers’ skirts with wide eyes scared and desperate.

Kakashi can sense their discomfort, the wavering magic pulsing inside them under the pressure of strangers, trained to protect them and obey them but still raw enough to wander on its own. If he wasn’t so old and used to the art of mastering magic, the gnawing of his anxiety and regret would be enough to send his powers scattering hazardously around him, creating havoc. But Minato-sensei, kind and gentle and strong Minato-sensei taught him well, didn’t he? And Kushina, brash and loyal and powerful Kushina taught him too, didn’t she?

They were like parents to him, weren’t they?

So why did he fail them? Why did he fail Naruto?

He enters a dark alley by his right, being hesitantly followed by Sakura and Sasuke. He can see the trembling of Sasuke’s hand, the way he wants flames to give some light to the path, but the way he doesn’t, too scared or too proud Kakashi can’t tell. His black eye blends perfectly with the dimness, but his blue one— blue like the ocean and the sky and the spell his sensei created on his own, a whirlwind powerful enough to blast the whole village they’re in— is wide and trying to sense the shifts in midst of the darkness, to sense dangers if there are any, so wide and fearful and determined and so, so strange to see on Sasuke.

He knocks on the concealed door. He had been there enough times to know appearing on the main store wouldn’t be wise considering how deeply Kushina’s tempestuous personality runs within her son. So he waits and pleads that someone will get the door instead of forcing him to cause a scene by showing up unannounced when Naruto can barely control himself from trying to hit Kakashi whenever he is around, especially because this time there will be no Jiraiya to soften the kid.

The door opens, and a mane of blonde hair greets him, with suspicious eyes finding his face and scowling.

The kid opens the door enough to let the three of them pass, not muttering a word or attempting to attack Kakashi or expel him from his shop. So he must be a clone, Kakashi believes.

The clone, still not saying anything, guides them out of the back shop, not giving any time for his students to take in the space and everything it has, to the front shop, by the long and narrow hallway lit by torches perched on the wall by rusty nails that haven’t turned to dust yet thanks to magic. The front shop, as usual, smells divinely of rich scents that linger in the trails of smoke and mingle with the ones already encrusted on the walls and fabrics of the couches, pillows, and curtains. But this time there are no clients and the curtains are drawn shut so no light can get in, and the door has the sign saying ‘Closed’ to the outsiders.

The clone points them to a set of couches, with a grunt and a nod, but it doesn’t look either of them in the eyes and nor does it speak to them. The group of three sits, albeit wary of the placement they’re in— lonely on a strange place with someone they don’t know and have yet to meet, at least Sasuke and Sakura—, and the boy disappears behind the counter, on a door that they neither of the kids remember seeing before.

“What is this place?” Sakura questions, more curiously than demanding and so unlike something Sasuke would do if he wasn’t so pissed.

“Jiraiya decided to ‘retire’ from magic life and dedicated himself to this shop and his writing. After deciding to keep Naruto he preferred to stay away from danger and take care of him. But he’s a Sannin so no matter what he knew he couldn’t stay away from our world for the rest of his life or keep Naruto from it so he trained them and kept the back store for magic users.”

Sakura nods, but it’s clear to anyone who looks that she still wants to ask much more. Unlike her, however, Sasuke finally decides to speak up.

“Why did he want to get away?”

Kakashi opens his mouth to answer— or at least that’s what he appears to do by the sight on his masks curling around his mouth— but someone beats him to the chase.

“Because my parents were killed.”

The three look to behind the counter, to the young boy whose face is stubbornly set in a scowl, this one feeling as real as themselves, no longer a clone but a real person with breathing lungs and a beating heart and warm skin thrumming with magic.

Kakashi attempts to say something but he stops, staring between Sasuke and Naruto when the blond’s expression morphs from annoyance to surprise.

Sasuke can’t look away, can’t force his eyes to move from the boy with the eye as blue as the ocean and the sky and everything in between, and with the eye so dark it seems to swirl like ink or the shadows from the vigilantes hiding in the dark. He has found _him_ , his soulmate, his _home_.

_‘“I’m giving you a chance to find another home.”’_

This is what the Fifth meant.

_They knew_.

He pushes himself off the couch, stumbles on his feet and fallen pillows, doubles over himself to get to the boy, to _Naruto_. His eyes are blue, both of them now, blue like thunders from his _Chidori_ , blue like the summer sky and the waters of the lake when the sun warms and shows what’s beneath the surface to an abyss bellow, so blue, so wide, so deep he gets lost. He is by the counter, ignoring Kakashi’s voice, Sakura’s, anyone’s.

_Naruto_.

_Naruto!_

Sadness really is unbecoming of a boy made of sunshine hair, sunshine skin, sunshine eyes.

“Narut-…” He starts, mouth so dry like sandpaper like every drop of water is within those eyes and he is but a desert.

“Don’t touch me!”

Sasuke freezes.

Kakashi is by his side, holding his shoulders comfortingly, adding pressure to the knots building in his muscles. He can’t look away from the boy— Naruto—, from the wideness of his eyes and the horror and surprise and fear and wild, _wild…_ _something…_

He is scared…? Of what? Why would he be scared of him?

Why is he scared of _him_?

Sakura is by his side as well, guiding him back to the couch when he still can’t move his eyes from the blond. Kakashi stays, close, _closer_ than him. But he can’t move, he is frozen and lost and hopeless because he has found his home and his home doesn’t want him anywhere near.

His friend moves her tepid hands to his backs, gently rubbing him, using her mint green magic to add warmth to his cells when he feels so cold. She knows what it feels like though she was never _rejected_. She knows, and he didn’t and now that he does he doesn’t think like anything can feel this bad, this cold, this _lonely and wrong and raw like a tender wound still bloody and achy.._.

Kakashi joins, moving to crouch in front of Sasuke.

“It’s alright, you’re alright. He’s just scared Sasuke, he’s not used to people or to touch, it’s alright Sasuke, you’ll be alright.”

Not used to touch?

_‘“Because my parents were killed.’”_

Sasuke still remembers the warmth of his mother’s hands on his hair, the warmth of Obasan’s hugs, warmth, and warmth, and so much warmth. Even when his clan met its downfall leaving him to be the sole avenger and later the sole rebuilder of his clan’s former glory, there was warmth from those who knew better than to pity him. Warmth like flames and fire and burning pyres with corpses and so much warmth and he is made of it despite always feeling so cold and numb and lonely.

No touch or warmth?

He must feel lonely too.

The scent of tea makes the three of them look up, to see Naruto approach bashfully red, grabbing the tray with cups and a scented tea for dear life. He sets the tray down on the coffee table and starts serving cups for everyone without asking who wants some or not.

He sits on the floor, with a pillow cushioning his ass. Seemingly out of nowhere, a bright orange fox appears, with black marking on its fur just beneath its eyes, leaping to sit on his lap, regarding the strange people on the shop with sharp interest on its red eyes so wise and ancient-looking. If they squint hard enough they can just see its tail doubling in many more tails when it moves, and not just one as the illusion makes it seem. The fox’s eyes stop when they find Sasuke’s, and its lids seem to narrow down to test the boy, study him and see if he is worthy of being Naruto’s soulmate, of _Naruto_.

When the fox doesn’t seem to want to jump at his neck, Sasuke assumes it didn’t mind as much as its owner.

“I thought I had been clear when I said I didn’t want you here, you bastard.” It is Naruto who speaks first, stubborn and looking away with his lips in a pout similar to a spoiled kid’s. Kakashi has the nerve to look bashful, taking a hand to the nape of his neck and smiling truthfully apologetic, with his visible eye wrinkling in the corners.

“I apologize, Naruto-kun, but a mission is a mission and I couldn’t say no to the Hokage’s orders.”

“Tsunade no baa-chan has taken the chair already, hm.” Naruto takes a sip of his tea, squinting when neither of the others make any motion to grab a cup. Kakashi is the first to both grab and takes a sip, nodding approvingly. Sakura is second and Sasuke, just shy of being rejected, tastes the tea in last.

The scent is floral and fruity, like silk and tulle, and it tastes like childhood memories and cherry blossoms in the warm breeze of summer, the ones who swayed alongside with the wind back in the compound of his clan.

“Let me guess, looking for Ero-sennin?” Sakura looks to Kakashi for an answer, and Sasuke would too if he wasn’t so lost trying not to blatantly stare at him.

“W-Who?”

“He means Jiraiya. He writes hm-… adult novels.”

“You can say porn books, Kakashi, if they’re your students I bet they’ve seen what a pervert you can be as well.” Kakashi stares at him offended but all the kids can do is laugh lightly. Even Sasuke snorts behind his hand, being met by his sensei’s betrayed glare.

“Maa, maa… Let’s focus here.” Naruto straightens his backs, putting the cup of tea on the table to put his whole attention on Kakashi. Maybe on another day, when there wouldn’t be a weight of loss on his backs, no news of the Third’s death still running wild in the village, maybe on another day when yet another Hokage hadn’t been killed, Naruto would be brash like Ero-sennin says his dead mother was. But his wounds— the ones he so firmly says are healed— are raw and bleeding and he is reminded of yet another person lost to war and people used as towers and horses and bishops and pawns like in a chess game to suit other’s dark intentions.

“Orochimaru is back and even with Tsunade-sama we need more help. She’s asking for Jiraiya-sama because we’re vulnerable now.”

“I don’t know where he is. He left two weeks ago and I haven’t heard anything from him since then.”

Sasuke falters, his brow shooting up inquisitively. Kakashi seems to sense the shift in him and moves to put a hand on his shoulder, but if it is to soothe him he hopes his sensei knows it’s not really helping, and if anything it leaves him even more angry at how useless adults seem to be when it comes to taking fucking care of teenagers if not for war.

“You’ve been here by yourself for _two weeks_? And he hasn’t even said anything?”

Naruto scratches his neck and smiles awkwardly, a lopsided grin hesitant and shameful.

“Yeah, what about it?”

But before Sasuke can start a list of everything that is wrong with leaving a kid when so many things can go wrong, a kid who is already an _orphan_ and never went to the Academy…

“So you have no idea?”

The boy made of sunshine hesitates, wondering whether or not he should tell the truth and realizing there is no one he can trust but Kurama and himself, in this room. Especially not Kakashi who all but left him to die and suffer in an orphanage until Jiraiya got there for him when he was six. Especially not the pretty boy with eyes black like the night and the store at night, the boy whose touch he so eagerly wanted to feel but was scared to confirm all the stories about how a soulmate makes everyone feel at home when there’s nowhere else to go.

Because having a home in someone is asking to be hurt when things go south and someone dies and he doesn’t feel like depending on someone when everything he has ever done in his life is being independent and learning to take care of himself so that no one would ever have enough power over him.

So he is scared to tell them anything, especially not to Kakashi and especially to the pretty boy who might as well be made of a game of darkness and light.

“No.”

Kakashi nods slowly, doubtfully. Then he gets up and walks until he is standing in front of Naruto, casting an elongated shadow over the small boy dressed in an oversized orange jacket. Naruto gulps, audibly, trying his best to stay calm even though he’s sure Kakashi saw right through his lie— because Naruto doesn’t know how to lie, no matter how hard Jiraiya tries to train him.

“You’re coming with us.”

“Wha- No!” He cries out, jumping to his feet fast like a lightning bolt cutting the sky in half. The fox in his lap prepares itself to attack, growling and showing the glint of its fangs at Kakashi, sensing his master’s distress but still replaying the man’s words, over and over, as he can sense the shift in the air, the danger of his kit staying here alone when he can see the slithering shadows approaching...

“Please calm your familiar and come with us, it’s not safe Naruto, you know it’s not.” It’s the closest thing to beg they’ve ever seen Kakashi do, his eye pleading his hands hesitating between twisting themselves and getting close to the boy. “You can bring Kurama with you and whatever else you want, but come with us.”

“No!”

Kurama knows, he just _does,_ that staying here, alone, without someone as powerful as the Sannin to help is the most dangerous thing they can do. He nubs his wet nose against Naruto’s leg, looking up to meet his eyes with his own and communicate through the link they share as master and familiar.

He has to save his kit, he _has_ to.

_Go with them._

Naruto’s brow shoots up, incredulous and still considering, debating his odds as wary and angry as he is.

_I can’t._

_Please, kit, please._

_But Kakashi-…—_ emotion raw and unyielding, he can sense it, feel it as if he too is human just like this boy under his care, this boy who will be great and known one day, this boy who can control air and bend heaven and hell to save and to destroy. He can sense it, the hesitance, the insecurity of many years bullied to exhaustion and submission, abandoned to his own luck when life proved he had none.

_He can help, he can help now._

_Are you sure?_

_I’ll protect you._

And he can sense, just grab and feel it on his fur, on his tongue, on his nose, everywhere, surrounding him like the oxygen he breathes, like ocean and sky and so many other natural things made by Gods for monsters and humans (though they’re the same)… his trust, his resolve burning bright and lovingly because he _trusts_ and _loves_ and _gives_ and Kurama knows if anything is to happen to Naruto— the same brat who exhausted him to submission with his unwavering kindness and his unending love for a _monster_ no less— he will ravage whoever hurt his kit, destroy everything to shreds and…

_Okay, I trust you Kurama._

The fox nudges Naruto’s leg, fond even, to the other kids’ astonishment. Sasuke can easily count how many people managed to forge a contract with a familiar, as it is rare now when magic is so wild and unyielding to those untrained. But Naruto, despite never setting a foot inside the Academy, has a familiar, a _fox_ , a cunning and loyal familiar, orange and red, red eyes like flames and hatred and blood. The Sannin are three of those who managed, the Third had a familiar as well and Kakashi, against all odds if you consider his lack of teaching abilities, somehow managed a contract with dogs. He can remember scrolls, ancient and forsaken now that his home was burned and bloodied by sins of his own kin, of birds of prey being the easiest for his family but he can’t remember anyone of his clan managing a contract.

Yet the boy in front of him, wearing orange like he wants every attention to himself, with eyes so tender and honest and blue, blue, blue when his life has been red, red, red, has a familiar, a _fox_ , a fox with more than one tail so not a simple spirit but he remembers…

“Okay.”

He gasps, but he is not the only one and he looks to Kakashi to see him staring openly blunt and not trying to put up a mask to cover what he’s thinking and feeling at the moment when Naruto agrees after being so adamant at saying no.

Through it all, Sasuke can feel the pain subsiding and hope settling warm and kind inside of his chest. Maybe not all is lost.

Maybe he can still find a home and be a home himself.

“Okay.” Kakashi nods, still surprised, moving out of the way so Naruto can go grab his things. The blond watches him by the corner of his eye, curiously, carefully, Sasuke can’t really tell. “Oh, I haven’t introduced you guys: Naruto, this is Sakura, she’s a healer.”

“Nice to meet you, Naruto.” Sakura smiles, kindly like the puppy she is always ready to be, and he smiles back, brightly, blindingly, like the sunshine Sasuke so easily associates with him.

“And this is Sasuke, he’s a fire wielder.”

This time Naruto doesn’t smile, and Sasuke can’t bottle up the disappointment and frustration he feels for that, at least not immediately but he is sure he can manage to-

“Hi.”

Sasuke can’t breathe.

Naruto’s cheeks are a lovely shade of pink, like Sakura’s hair and yet brighter and turning crimson, and staining his tanned cheeks, the marks on his cheeks that remind him so much of whiskers, and his smile so bashful and kind and curious and honest and-

“Hi.”

And Naruto who has never been one for physical touch— or maybe he has and is just too scared to find that he likes it and that it was never his fault those awful things people did to him back in the orphanage, that he too deserves tenderness and care— just wants to see if his hair, _Sasuke’s_ hair, is as soft as it looks under the flattering light so dim it accentuates the angles on his face and the darkness that swirls within his dark, dark eyes.

“Sasuke, why don’t you go help Naruto pack, if that’s okay?” The second part of the question is made to Naruto, who doesn’t seem to do as much as nod, still captivated by the boy who apparently is his soulmate. But he doesn’t seem to object, either, rather leading the way through the store, his fox by his side, stealing furtive glances as if to test Sasuke yet again.

They get to the badly lit hallway again, and Sasuke must resist the urge to make the flames stronger and brighter. Naruto looks back to see him twisting his fingers in anxiousness, and stares at him inquisitively with his head falling slightly to his left side, but he never asks what’s wrong, why Sasuke has stopped in the middle of the corridor, unmoving and observant.

He just flicks his wrist, quick like a flash, and Sasuke can feel a shy breeze brushing past him, playing with the hairs on the back of his neck, and then the flames roar higher, settling brighter and much more alive than before.

He whispers ‘thank you’ and Naruto’s wonderstruck smile returns just as fiercely, this time making Sasuke the blushing one. If he focuses hard enough he can just feel the lingering breeze still there, like caring fingers soothing away his worries, but Naruto has already turned his backs to him again, walking forward to the end of the seemingly endless hallway. Afar the burning candles are still dim but one by one and the flames soar like tongues or wings or anything holy and magical and even when Sasuke reminds himself he’s been around magic his whole life there’s something strangely new and so much more gracious and noticeable when Naruto is the one doing it.

And even when the Uchiha has never felt the need to end the silence, now he just wants Naruto to talk, to tell him of his life, of his abilities, of his fox familiar so submissive and protective despite being one of the hardest animals to bind and submit, of his dreams and ambitions and fears and everything he keeps inside his sunshine head.

“I’m a natural wind wielder.” He speaks up, finally and at last, not quite shy but not energetic either. Sasuke believes it to be a good start, but he still can’t speak up. “My mother was a natural wind wielder, just like my father, but they were both able to use water as well, and my father… well…”

The Uchiha waits for him to finish his thought, but Naruto turns left and when Sasuke follows and the blond remains silent, he knows he won’t be hearing any more of what he was saying for a while. He stares, curiously and more of a second thought, to the room Naruto guided him, to the bamboo folding screen pushed against the wall in between two single-beds. The deteriorated walls are filled with humidity and cracks, and the boy can feel the tingling of magic holding them together as if everything is close to burst and turn to ashes if one is careless.

But what catches his attention the second his eyes just brush over it, is the picture frame on top of a drawer, staring at both beds. There’s a shock of blond hair and a long river of blood-red hair and two sets of smiling blue eyes.

It’s the Yondaime— Sasuke would recognize that face anywhere after passing through the painting so many times on the main corridor back at the Academy. He’s the whispered name on everyone’s mouths whenever things seem too hopeless and heavy because he was the hero who saved millions of lives, the hero who killed one of the tailed-beasts and-…

“Those are my parents.”

The faint words are spoken so low and breathily it startles him with the suddenness and the content. He snaps his neck in shock to see that Naruto is transfixed on the picture, a look of both longing and fond affection turning his bright eyes a bit duller at the edges. If he is to be honest, the resemblance between the Yondaime and Naruto is unmistakable— the same wilderness of blonde hair and expressive blue eyes and tanned skin— but there’s something of his mother on him, something Sasuke can’t quite place but knows is there _somehow_ , just hiding somewhere in his face, in _him_.

“Jiraiya says I have her smile, her temper, and her bottomless pit of magic, but the rest is pretty much my dad’s.”

“My clan used to say I reminded them more of my mother than of my father.” Sasuke finds himself sharing back, not because Naruto makes it look likes he owes him anything, but because there’s so much bottled up— a knot, lump, that grows and grows inside his throat and becomes more and more unbereable and hard to ignore— that he has the need to talk, to let him now the burden of loss and misplacement and loneliness is not something he needs to carry on his own because Sasuke _understands_ him.

“But they kept saying Itachi was so much like my father so I was always annoyed.”

Naruto laughs, softly like a ripple, and then it blooms and turns louder to a whole wave, a boisterous gargle that echoes inside Sasuke’s chest filling the hollowness.

“I bet you sulked all the time.” He jokes, a twinkle of mischief on his eyes when he turns to him. The whiskers on his cheeks deepen when he gives a crooked-smile, and it sends Sasuke’s heart stumbling madly and crazily from his chest to the bottom of his stomach, kept only by its heartstrings.

“I did no such thing!”

“Oh my god, you’re sulking right now! And pouting!”

“Dobe.”

“Teme!”

Kakashi appears on the doorway, peeking slightly out of breath and a scowl firmly set on his features. Sakura is behind him with her arms crossed, and her puppy look is nowhere to be seen, but rather replaced by a sudden sense of calm anger and pity. The fox, to which Sasuke still doesn’t know anything about other than it’s Naruto’s familiar, must’ve noticed the look on Kakashi’s face and interpreted it as a threat, for it leaps to stay in front of his kit, showing no fangs and never growling but flattening its ears against its skull and keeping its tail ramrod straight as it falls bristly.

“For your sake and mine, I really hope you haven’t been eating only ramen for the past two weeks, Naruto.”

Sasuke blinks, slowly, astonished and surprised and hopeful there’s some sort of misunderstanding, some sort of-…

But Naruto can only scratch the back of his neck, embarrassed, and then Kakashi is scowling harder and Sakura’s face is all red— Sasuke knows she’s close to bursting then— and the fox turns to Naruto as if to say ‘this is your fight and I won’t help you’ and Sasuke…

And Sasuke is on _fire._ His veins are burning within his skin, furious, livid, sorrowful because why is he left alone, with no adult to help, no one to cook for him or to give him _warmth_ and touch. Why is a boy his age, an orphan like him, in these conditions, why is the Fourth’s son, a _hero’s_ son, in these conditions?

“You-…” He starts, shaking and ready to burn the world if it means Naruto will have some well-deserved warmth, “Are coming with us and you will _stay_ there for the rest of your fucking life, I don’t care if you like it or not.”

“Oi, teme, dattebayo!”

“Sasuke-kun is right!” The pretty girl with pretty pink hair and big mint eyes closes her hands to fists and he flinches, not even processing it until the three of them are looking at him so openly horrified that he finds himself blushing more and more and he can no longer decipher if it’s from the attention or the worry or the obviously unhealthy habit of eating ramen at every meal whenever Jiraiya isn’t there to argue with him for it.

_Finally, someone other than that Pervert stepping up to give you the care you deserve._ Kurama all but purrs, nudging his head against Naruto’s leg in a fond mocking, noticing the bashful and astonished look his kit can’t stop from swallowing his whole face.

“It’s really fine, guys, there’s no need to--…”

“I’ll stop you right there, Naruto Namikaze-Uzumaki.” Sakura gasps, recognizing the Fourth’s last name, and Kakashi crosses his arms in the authoritarian way he rarely even uses with them, and upon seeing it the three kids gulp— Sasuke will argue anyone who says he did, though— and become mute and frozen.

But, apparently, Naruto becomes louder when intimidated and despite cringing, he takes a step forward to lock eyes with the adult. The fox, Sakura notices, seems to nod despairingly, and before the sunshine boy can even begin to snap back, the fox grabs him by the hem of the shirt and pulls him to the other side of the room, onto the bed, while he tries to resist.

_Will you stop being a stubborn_ _brat and start grabbing your things? I’m getting too old for this._

_You’re supposed to be on my side, you old fox, ‘ttebayo!_

_We’re running out of time and I’m running out of patience, scrawny little shit, hurry up._

“Are they always like this?” Sakura murmurs to Kakashi, not taking her eyes off the growling familiar and pouting teenager, both who seem to exchange a telepathic argument. At last, Naruto flashes his tongue to the fox— and Sakura wonders if animals are able to roll their eyes because she’s sure this one _is_ — and kneels by the bed, trying to grab something from underneath. She’s never heard anyone so young, but Kiba and Ino maybe, curse so much, but Naruto apparently has no qualms when it comes to it and swears left and right under the expressively bored red eyes of his familiar, whose glare doesn’t shift but Sakura can swear the edges soften ever-so-slightly.

Kakashi hums before answering her. “Naruto and Kurama have a strange relationship.”

From the little she has seen, Sakura has to agree.


	3. Homebound

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> To Sasuke, someone who’s made of sunshine shouldn’t be an air wielder.  
> or  
> In which Sasuke knows where home is and is halfway there.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> What do you mean the Academy looks awfully like Hogwarts? Never heard of such a thing. Also never heard of chapters’ length consistency. And Kurama being a little bitch? Sure, I live for it.

It’s surprisingly nightfall, by the time they get to the Academy, tired and sweaty and Kakashi can’t count how many times Kurama had to bite Naruto awake. He can see how much Sasuke wants to help him, and still stays by his side, silently stealing glances by the corners of his eyes.

When they arrive at the gates, Naruto stalls by staying behind considerably, and Sakura, who is going ahead, is the last to notice so. Yet, no matter how much Kurama tries to push him forward, the kid doesn’t bulge.

“What’s wrong?” Sasuke, never leaving his side, takes a step closer though he doesn’t try to touch him no matter how much he would like to. Naruto bites his lip, absently, nervously, and turns his head to look at him and give a weak smile as a response, eyes hooded by exhaustion.

“Jiraiya always said the Academy taught things in a way I would never understand. My mom had trouble too, I think it comes with our poor magic control. Another thing Ero-sennin said I inherited from her.” Naruto takes another grounding breath, eyes lost again on the building within the walls. Kakashi is inside but hasn’t moved from the gates either, despite pretending not to look at them. “He said the day I would come to the Academy was the day my life would change forever.”

“And do you think that’s a good thing?” Sasuke asks, unable to shake off the bad feeling that the Sage must know something judging by those words, something that he hasn’t told Naruto either, and feeling closer to the sunshine-filled-boy with deep understanding.

But instead of answering, Naruto smiles, his bright eyes closing and wrinkling on the corners and the whiskers deepening, no longer affected by that hesitancy and tiredness.

Sasuke watches his backs as he continues to walk, and then looks to his right side, where Kurama awaits, unmoving, not following Naruto. His red eyes give Sasuke a glimpse of something he never thought anyone would feel as deeply as himself: rage, unyielding, overwhelming, authoritarian rage. The more Sasuke looks at him the more clearly he sees the tails flickering behind him, like tongues of fire, red and orange and with a mind of their own— he counts one, two, three, four, five, six, seven…? No, eight, nine. Nine tails; and he remembers whispers, meetings within the clan at nights and…

The fox furrows his sullen eyes, red like flames and blood and war, and shifts his neck to look to the ethereal edges of Naruto’s retreating body as it turns smaller by the distance, and the flames turn to a fond hearth instead.

Kurama curves its head, though his eyes remain defiantly open and alert, staring down on the human boy, and they come to an understanding.

Sasuke has lost his home once, but it won’t happen again.

It’s forbidden to walk the corridors after curfew, especially now when it’s so dangerous to bend rules and ignore the authority, but Sasuke is restless and no bone on his body feels the need to sleep when his head is going wild.

He hasn’t seen Naruto ever since they arrived, after the small conversation by the gates, since Kakashi took him straight away to the Hokage’s office and the door remained closed, no one leaving not even for dinner. It’s appalling how he’s met his soulmate and yet they’ve spent little to no time together, haven’t even _mentioned_ the fact the universe decided they would be the perfect match for each other. Sasuke can’t even remember reasons why he should be wary of the fact his soulmate is a _boy_ , not after seeing Kakashi and Iruka together, and Sakura and Ino. Soulmates are precious and rare and Sasuke can’t see any problem other than they’re not _acting_ on it.

And there’s the rational side of his brain telling him he should take it slow, that he’s rushing things, that he and Naruto don’t know each other well enough for him to feel so lonely without the presence of that ball of sunshine by his side. But he has lost enough time running from things, already, and he’s not ready to ignore anything as major any longer.

So he throws his sheets aside and decides to go barefoot, to keep the sound at the bare minimum. He wills his magic to gather at his fingertips, conjuring small flames to light the way. He’s fast and nimble and gets to the main hallway faster than he expected, but it’s more surprising that no adults roam the Academy— he hopes his gut is just as right as usual by staying quiet— and before walking to the door of the office, he stops in front of paintings of every Hokage, rather in front of the Fourth’s painting.

His face is serious but Sasuke can just barely make out the curve of his lip threatening to bloom into a smile, and the bright of his eyes is duller than on the picture Naruto showed him. The shade of blinding blond hair isn’t as accurate and he muses to himself that whoever painted it must’ve had a tough time doing it, as everything in Minato seems unnaturally bright and impossible to recreate by anything other than Gods and Nature. There’s so much of Naruto in him that Sasuke finds himself grabbing his shirt on top of his chest to keep his treacherous heart from leaping out of his chest.

The door remains closed but there seems to be some commotion, scaring Sasuke so he presses himself against the wall and kills the flames, afraid of someone finding him out of his bed. When no one shows up to yell at him, he ignites the flames back to his fingertips and loses no more time staring at Namikaze Minato, the Fourth, the hero, the father of his soulmate.

He expects the door to be surrounded by anti-hearing spells, like a fort, but when he presses his ear against it he can hear muffled voices. It’s careless, _too_ careless, but right now he doesn’t care, not when it gives him the opportunity to hear what’s happening on the other side of the door.

“Naruto, we need to know.” It’s the Fifth who’s speaking and Sasuke can just imagine the furrow of the blond brows, the way she interlaces her fingers and rests her elbows on top of her desk and keeps her head atop her hands. And he can feel the presence of Kakashi’s magic, volatile like lightning but contained at the moment. And the breathy presence, the turbulent current of fresh and inexperienced and stormy energy? That can only be Naruto’s.

“I don’t know where he is you old hag, I’ve been telling you this for hours, dattebayo!”

“And I say it’s bullshit, you brat. You can’t lie for shit and you know it so just tell me where he is!”

“Now, now, no need to-…” Kakashi tries.

“Shut up!” Two voices join and a sigh follows, resigned.

“I don’t think you understand the situation in our hands, Naruto. Orochimaru managed to get to us, he killed the Third, and he’s preparing for war. Sarotobi-sensei might have stopped him but it’s only temporary. We need Jiraiya to be here, _I_ need Jiraiya to be here. Do you understand? More people, good people, _innocent_ people will die if we wait any longer!”

Silence. Sasuke holds his breath, waiting for anyone to break the silence, for anyone to say something. Finally, softly and subsided, Naruto speaks, shakily.

“He went to Uzushio. He said the Academy would come for me and that you would keep me safe until he came back. He told me he would gather scrolls and make alliances but he never told me with who.”

It rings a memory, the name, like he remembers the way it rolls out of his mother’s lips and the faded nod of his father’s head. It’s an island, he knows that much, and…

“Thank you.” A chair drags over the floor and the door opens abruptly, sending Sasuke stumbling back. Naruto’s bright eyes are wide open when they lock with Sasuke’s and they’re teary and Sasuke can’t breathe. Kakashi calls the blond’s name softly but he keeps running and Kurama follows and Sasuke… Sasuke must follow him too.

They’re outside. The sky is dark and there are so many smoky spots he can’t see any star or constellation, and the moon peeks from behind cotton-candy clouds in a large hallo of light.

Naruto is bending by the waist, his hands on his knees as his breathing is ragged and leaves in puffs of smoky air. Sasuke catches up to him, as out of breath, and keeps himself from breaking the silence or making any motion to disrupt the pensive boy in front of him. Instead, he follows Naruto’s lead as he sits on the grass and loses himself on the sight of the night sky devoid of any stars.

“Kurama is not a simple familiar, y’ know? Ever heard of the Tailed Beasts? The beings made of magic? Kurama is the Nine-Tailed-Fox. My mom, Kushina, was the previous container and she successfully managed to contain him in me along with my dad, but Orochimaru and his army attacked that night and they died, even if Orochimaru couldn’t take me with him. You can’t kill a Tailed Beast, never, but with enough knowledge on dark magic, you can draw their magic and use it. Forever. It’s an eternal and never-ending pitch of magic.”

Sasuke looks to his side, to the sunshine boy whose light is so dim now, with the three whisker marks on each cheek, with the deep eyes of heaven and earth and in between, teary and red and his nose running. When Naruto turns to him, Sasuke can’t breathe and his heart shatters because he knows what it’s like to have a burden pushing him to the dark place from where he came from, and unlike him Naruto, always cheerful and smiley and brash and impulsive Naruto, shouldn’t have to keep pushing back so the weight doesn’t crush him.

“I’m always telling you random stuff about me, I’m sorry. I bet it’s annoying.” He wants to say no, that he enjoys getting to know Naruto, that it’s not annoying in the least, but Naruto is talking before he can say anything to correct him. “It’s just… there’s something about you. I look at you and I get this feeling that you understand me even if I don’t say anything, like we _met_ before, y’ know? Or maybe I’m just imagining things and-…”

“I know.” That gets him to shut up, almost as if he didn’t expect Sasuke to actually agree with him. There’s that whole aura of aloofness and superiority and the feeling of flaming wrath red like the blood that he is used to seeing swirling within Kurama’s eyes. It’s hatred and betrayal and a desperate need to find himself after years of disregarding his own identity, chasing after whatever gives his life meaning. It’s the loneliness that comes with losing his home, his people, the loneliness that comes with losing the ability to feel like he belongs. While Naruto hides it behind cheerfulness— the only lie he manages to keep— Sasuke shuts off everyone out and for someone with a natural affinity for fire he seems to be impossibly cold.

So it comes with a surprise, really, that he understands Naruto’s rambling and actually feels the same way. Naruto knows he’s not easy, many people went out of their ways to tell him that in the most various ways, and Jiraiya always reminds him that it’s not true but there are many things time can never heal, and it shows in the way he never allows anyone to be physically close enough to touch him, and to know that someone so different feels the same about him, is not repulsed by the bratty orphan that tries too hard to be cheerful so no one has any reason to dislike him, surely feels like a breath of fresh air, like maybe he too can belong somewhere other than by himself.

Sasuke opens his mouth, most likely to continue what he was saying, yet Kurama takes his head off Naruto’s lap to stare at some point behind them, and then Kakashi’s voice speaks up and it’s composed and flat but the quirk of his brow makes Naruto blush all the same.

“You’re not supposed to be here.” Sasuke curses in a mumble, and it makes Naruto snort breathily. Kakashi disapproves with a nod but there’s something deeply mischievous and perverted in the way he tips his head and lifts one corner of his lips. “And since we don’t have a designated room for Naruto yet, what do you say of letting him sleep in yours?”

Fucking Kakashi.

“Hn.”

Naruto has the impression that’s the closest thing to a ‘yes’ they’ll get, and Kakashi seems to share that opinion for he turns on his backs but walks slowly as if waiting for them. Sasuke sends a fireball his way— or his ass’s way, but those are only details— and he narrowly escapes, easily and not even acknowledging Sasuke. Naruto breaks into full-blown laughs, laugh that echo inside Sasuke’s chest yet again, and he takes his moments to contemplate how beautiful Naruto is. His lids are closed and his head is thrown back. His whiskers are deep and they sink into his cheeks like dimples. His hair, a golden halo, surrounds his face like a crown, like sunshine rays.

When he turns to him and opens his eyes, blue, blue, blue, deep and alluring and enticing and they pull Sasuke to the point he’s drowning within those depthless, bottomless, endless pits of blue, blue, blue.

 _Home_.

He’s no longer laughing, but smiling, softly, almost shy, kindly and refreshing yet it warms Sasuke. Their roles must be reversed, somehow, because Naruto is sunshine and everything cheerful and warm and he’s the day, the sun, not an air wielder, it’s impossible; because Sasuke is moonlight and everything brooding and cold and he’s the night, the moon, not a fire wielder, for sure. But Naruto is and Sasuke is too even when they’re anything but and there’s a pull, a magnetic need to stay side by side even if not touching, minding Naruto, even if not talking, minding Sasuke, just being in the same space.

And Sasuke? Sasuke can’t help but try to smile as well. It’s probably awful and stiff but Naruto only grins wider and makes no comment about it. Instead, he pushes himself up, dusts off his bright clothes— orange like fire— and waits for Sasuke to follow. His hand itches for him to help Sasuke to his feet but everything is going too well so it must be a sign that Naruto can’t really mess things up and if they touch… Naruto always loses people he touches.

So Naruto doesn’t help him to his feet, and instead decides to shove his hands deep inside his pockets, under Kurama’s openly snarky expression. He’s too smart for his own good, knows too well how his kit’s head works and what must be happening inside this very same moment. Sasuke leads the way to his room and Naruto, following with Kurama, tries to ignore the fox as long as he’s allowed.

_You’re fucked._

_Shut up._

_Naruto and Sasuke sitting in the tree…_

_Kurama, I swear to Gods I’ll choke you._

_Kinky little brat._

_Old stinky fox, dattebayo!_

“Everything alright?” Sasuke turns his head to stare to the glaring duo behind him. Kurama, the most human fox and now a lot more powerful than he previously thought— memories… he remembers them…— shrugs the best a fox can and Naruto scratches the back of his neck, looking away with a pout on his lips and pink-stained nose.

“Kurama is just being stupid, don’t mind him.”

The raven-haired boy resumes his walking, a shrug of his own and a non-committal ‘hn’ following his movements. Kakashi is still there, waiting. Naruto can’t really understand how peaceful things are between the two, how the thrum of betrayal he always feels around the man is awfully quiet. But then again, if there’s one thing Naruto doesn’t do is hold grudges and maybe he’s been holding onto the fact that Kakashi abandoned him in that orphanage, took him there himself and left him there for six years, for far too long. It’s time to let go. Times are changing and people are dying and _sure_ he wasn’t a very nice person but he had just lost his paternal figure and there was a war raging so to hell with it. Naruto doesn’t hold grudges and this won’t be any different.

So he takes a deep breath, in and out, the coolness of the night air quieting down his nerves and his pain and he stares ahead. There’s another war coming and people will die, for sure. More people, good people, and innocent people, to a default. Tsunade no baa-chan was right, _is_ right. And Kakashi might die or even himself and many people have died and those who haven’t keep regrets about not saying everything they should’ve to those who no longer breathe, so he doesn’t want to either become someone who regrets or someone’s regret. So he lets go, it’s all waters under the bridge and he can’t hold a grudge any longer, especially now that he will be so close to him and their relationship will have to stop being so strained for everyone’s sake.

“Oi, Kakashi, how about you treat me to ramen?” Kakashi cranes his neck abruptly, shocked like Sasuke learns to associate with Naruto’s presence, and he stares deeply and unblinking into Naruto’s eyes. They’re blue and wide and twinkling with mischief and soft kindness. He sees Minato there and Kushina and even himself. Naruto shrugs his shoulders like this is something normal between them, like he hasn’t tried to punch the living daylights out of Kakashi from the moment they met and he decided to be honest with him. Like they’re more than mere acquaintances. “What? I’m starving. You and the old hag kept me from having dinner.”

“Huh-… Sure…?” Naruto grins even if his tone is more of a question than anything else.

The three of them walk to the dining hall and all seems well.


	4. Home

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> To Naruto, someone who touches him dies but perhaps he can save Sasuke from that fate.  
> or  
> In which Sasuke is home.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TRIGGER WARNING: anxiety attack.

It’s too early for Naruto, someone who’s used to silence and calmness in the mornings, to be hearing such noise. It looks awfully like someone is trying to destroy the whole Academy, to its heart’s content, and Naruto only keeps his eyes closed for another two seconds before springing out of his bed in a rush.

He’s in the Academy, right, and this noise is from a battle and-

Sasuke is not in the room.

His bed is empty and completely left in a messy array of sheets and pillows and a comforter covering the floor rather than the bed and it’s weird because Sasuke didn't strike him as someone who so easily leaves his things untidy.

Kurama is by the door, growling menacingly, his pointy hears flattened against his head and his nine tails flicker nervously, like flames roaming higher and higher, making him appear bigger than this ethereal form really his. Sure, Kurama in his whole glory of a Tailed Beast is a giant that could ravage the whole Academy with just his shadow, but this manifestation allowed only by Naruto, more ethereal than real though just as physical, has the same height of a normal fox, minus the nine tails he’s not concealing now. It scares Naruto to think Orochimaru might be back.

_Get up, kit, Jiraiya is back and he brought-… whatever see for yourself._

Kurama doesn’t even try to explain more and even if Ero-sennin’s mention does leave him a lot calmer, the rest of the unspoken information is enough to leave him on edge. Following his familiar’s instructions, Naruto throws the covers aside and takes off his sleeping cap, throwing it away as he slips his feet inside the fluffy slippers. Another blast resonates on the building, coming from outside, and he is sure even the closet shook a bit. Instead of going straight to the door, though, Naruto decides to go to the window and try to see what’s causing all the ruckus. The sight has him gasping and running fast and recklessly, like a whirlwind, down the hallway, and through the entrance doors. He faintly hears voices calling him, begging him not to interfere, but he can’t ignore what’s happening, he can’t…

He’s outside and Kurama is grabbing him by the hem of his shirt, by the flowing fabric of his pants, trying to hold him back but he can’t, he _can’t_!

“Stop!” And he turns to him then, eyes no longer black but red, red, red like blood and war and fire and… And it’s no longer black like darkness and ink and night but red and of course they’re red, he’s Itachi’s brother, an Uchiha and…

“Stay back!”

But he can’t! Because it’s not what it seems and he needs to hear Itachi first and…

“Naruto, leave him be.”

That get’s Sasuke’s attention, his Sharingan-red eyes, to snap from Naruto back to his older brother, shock and wrath and betrayal mixing and how he wants to kill him to take away his life just as he did to their family. And he knows Naruto, he knows his soulmate, his home, he knows _him._ And he could’ve hurt him or _worse_ , _kill_ him. And what does he mean ‘leave him be’? Why isn’t he stopping him?

The white-haired man— Sasuke remembers the picture Tsunade showed him yesterday, the boy in front of the Third with the snarky grin and kind eyes, and he must be Jiraiya— finally moves, his face a stoic mask of indifference and cold disapproval, and puts himself in the middle, between Itachi and Sasuke. At the same moment, Itachi doubles over and coughs, loudly, wetly, and brushes his fingers over his mouth to have them stained a deep crimson like Sasuke’s itching eyes, his own swirling eyes.

“Sasuke, just hear him out…” Naruto begs and he’s by his side, reaching out to touch his arm but never really making the actual move to do so. His eyes are large but hooded by his flurry of blond lids, his lips pulled on a firm line than speaks more when closed than when open, and Sasuke almost forgets the pull of blinding fury driving him ever since he felt the presence of Itachi’s magic pulling him out of his sleep. Only almost. It’s still there, pulsing on his veins, throbbing within his head, bleeding behind his eyes. It’s the need to destroy, to sever apart limbs from limbs, bones from bones and rip apart everything that makes Itachi a living man.

Kurama gets in between the two boys and his fangs are on full display, menacing and warningly shaking as he growls while staring right into Sasuke’s eyes. He doesn’t need the tie between master and familiar to understand what he means— something like ‘ _you either do it or you’ll wish you did’_ , more for Naruto’s sake than from actual care for him.

“As warming as this brotherly reunion was, I’m afraid we have more concerning matters to attend, Uchiha Sasuke.” The Sannin’s voice is gruff and easy to make itself heard. Sasuke stiffens as they cross paths, Itachi walking rather weakly instead of the poised way he normally did. The memory makes his already tense muscles become rock-hard, cramping his neck and shoulders from the strain consuming him. He watches almost hungrily the way Itachi gives and soft look to Naruto and the boy responds in kind, just as soft and apologetic. Sasuke’s brows shoot up in a questioning frown at that.

The duo follows Tsunade back inside, the crow still there shocked and murmuring and trying to understand who’s the new boy standing so close to Sasuke and still not suffering from his wrath or why family-killer Itachi is there with a Sannin, no less. Kakashi and Iruka push the students back inside with some effort, but Sakura and Naruto and Sasuke remain outside, one of them hesitates, the other worries and the other trembles. Sakura finally moves to gently touch Sasuke’s shoulder and sending tendrils of warm magic to calm his erratic heartbeat.

“Go back inside, both of you.” She asks, barely above a whisper. Naruto nods, grateful that she’s there, offering comfort when he can’t when he hesitates and fears, and she nods back, acknowledging him. Sasuke is numb and hopeless and lost and so empty it’s all a blur outside his head. He knows he’s walking, he can feel the pressure of the stone walls of the Academy, the dead stares of the paintings plastered on the wall, the rug stretching beneath his feet and the creak of the door opening. He feels cold despite the river of warmth from where Sakura had touched him, and even that begins to fade when the mattress dips underneath his weight. The presence beside him is now a breeze, a zephyr. The door closes and it’s all white noise.

And then the pressure behind his lids eases as the one inside his throat grows and he’s choking and bending forward and if his stomach wasn’t empty he would be throwing up right now but he hasn’t eaten since yesterday’s dinner and he’s crying like a lost soul and he’s choking on air and words are spoken but so muffled and fading into silence because he can’t _breathe_.

Hands grab his shoulders, grounding him, bringing him back. He opens his eyes to see the wet image of Naruto trembling and blurred at the edges. His mouth is moving so he’s speaking, but his chest is empty yet heavy and his lungs are both on fire and breaking like frozen water shattering on the floor. He can’t breathe and he can’t stop crying either and it’s pathetic and _he’s_ pathetic and he’s so weak, he feels so weak now that he can’t control himself and-…

“Breathe, Sasuke, deep breaths. You’re okay now, everything is okay, you’re safe.” Naruto’s voice is steady, a murmur, a constant flow making sure his hearth stays alive but is still easy to be controlled. And he feels his hands, they’re moving up and down his arms, rubbing him above his sleeves and not moving past them but they’re still _there, touching him_.

Naruto is touching him.

“Can you talk?” Sasuke chokes again and coughs, and nods up and down, down and up. “Good, can you count to twenty with me?”

They begin. The first three numbers are mostly spoken by Naruto alone, Sasuke having trouble speaking past the lump making a knot out of his throat. The next five are still unsteady, shaky, breathy. Past the ‘ten’, Sasuke’s heart is still heavy and leaping wildly inside of his chest, his lungs still weak and close to ripping in bloody gashes, but the tears clinging to his lashes are less common and the ones staining his cheeks begin to dry. Naruto’s voice gets more and more clearly, no longer white noise, but palpable and fond.

When they say twenty, Sasuke finds it easier to breathe.

“He-…” Naruto hushes him, not unkindly. His hands hesitate no more and they’re _warm_. His fingers are in his, his palm pressed against his own. The blond shivers, his hands tremble just like Sasuke’s and then he heaves forward and he’s breathing so loudly and deeply Sasuke fears he will have to help him out of an anxiety attack— and he’s awful at offering comfort. And they’re _touching_ , finally, _finally_.

Naruto looks up and he’s smiling and crying and he can’t speak but his teary eyes tell him everything he needs to know.

His fingers are not as calloused, but soft and warm and how is it that Sasuke thought he had no warmth in his life when he may as well be made of sunshine and warmth _itself_? So Sasuke grips harder, making sure this isn’t a dream, a magical illusion to give him something to miss when he goes back to reality. And Naruto grips back, hesitant and still so, so scared someone will snatch Sasuke away from him so he grips harder and cries harder and he pushes himself forward, pouring his heart out and melting against Sasuke but he is there to catch him.

They’re shaking against each other, silently crying but Naruto has never been silent and he won’t begin now so he sobs hard against Sasuke’s neck and his soulmate— because _that’s_ what he _is_ , his _soulmate_ — strokes his hair affectionately, holding onto him to keep him to himself and away from anything that tries to hurt him or take him away from him.

Because they’re home now, they’ve found themselves and everyone was right when they said meeting the one person the universe thought was right is indescribable. Sasuke feels himself at ease despite the memory of the previous encounter still there, in the back of his head, but at this moment, hugging Naruto, pressing him against his chest, nothing feels as important. And Naruto, one to draw back from any physical contact, now craves it as long as it is with Sasuke, Sasuke who understands him and Sasuke who…

“How do you know Itachi?”

Naruto breathes in a deep sigh, even if Sasuke doesn’t seem mad anymore but only exhausted, though that is just as terrifying. Naruto is used to having people beating him up for the dumbest reasons and even if his opinion on Sasuke has been biased by the fact they’re soulmates, he doesn’t think he will ever hurt him like that, even if it’s better to prevent something like that from happening.

“He and Jiraiya are… friends? Yeah, something like that. He’s been in the store once or twice and he… well, he told us what really happened.” He feels Sasuke stiffen around him, his hand gripping his body, clutching it closer, almost protectively against him. He hears the unsteady thrum of his heart against the shell of his ear, counts the heartbeats it takes for Sasuke to say something— one two, three, four, five six seveneight, nine, ten, e l e v e n…

“And you believe him?”

“I think you should hear what he has to say and take your own conclusions.”

And despite the fact he doesn’t say anything, despite the fact he can only hold Naruto’s still trembling body against him and distribute fond kisses of searing warmth against the crown of his head, pulling him closer until they burn, Sasuke chooses to trust Naruto and agree to it.

“Let’s try, okay? I want to try.”

Sasuke nods, once, twice, thrice. He’s adrift in an ocean of flames, facing the sun, letting it warm his cold, cold life. The sky is blue and endless and his life has been red, red, red red redredredred. But now he sees blue.

“Together.”

Sasuke is home again and Naruto has just found his.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Last chapter, open ending and not sure I’d be able to make this a whole fic but oh well, small pleasures are better than no pleasures amirite. Thank you for sticking with me to the end :)). Again, this was written in between depressive episodes so it's probably not all that good but I'm also kinda proud at the final product.

**Author's Note:**

> Self-indulgent and totally written during many depressive episodes. Constructive criticism is welcomed, homophobia and rudeness are not.


End file.
